Saturday, December 27, 2014

5 Ways to Make 2015 The Best Year Ever

As I reflected on in a blog post last week, 2014 has been a phenomenal year. Leaving the security of a full time merchandising job to pursue my dreams, growing my business, speaking opportunities & partnering with brands that share my vision- it's all been a crazy, wild ride. I'm excited to see what's in store for 2015!

I wanted to take you through the steps I take to plan from a holistic perspective for the next year. It's about more than just making new year's resolutions. It's about approaching things in an achievable manner, setting your sights on success & finding every excuse to celebrate along the way! Who's with me?

I'm sharing my guide to make 2015 the best year ever! These are all ways that I plan on growing as a blogger, business, and a person this year- and I'm excited to share and hear what you want to do to make this the best year ever!

1. Make a List of Goals (& Identify How You'll Achieve Them).

I think new year's resolutions are overrated! If you don't detail out how you'll achieve them or make them attainable, you'll end up letting yourself down. I think a more realistic approach to the new year is setting goals for yourself. The key to making your goals a reality is identifying the obstacles that are getting in the way of you achieving them- and then detailing out how you plan to remove that obstacle.

My girl Nicole, at Cedar and Rush just wrote a fantastic blog post about setting effective goals using this systematic approach and I love it- it just makes sense!

2. Find Your Focus

Think of a word that will guide your year in work and life. For me that word is presence - being able to stay focused on work, be in the moment and unplug when I'm with friends & loved ones an eliminate distractions! What will your word be?

Create a graphic in Canva or PicMonkey & refer to it often! Post is somewhere you'll see it daily. It's a great way to ensure it stays central in your life.

3. Create a Vision Board

I love vision boards. I think the idea of envisioning what you want for yourself and your future- and keeping those things top of mind puts things into perspective. It reminds you of why you're working so hard each and every day and what your goals and dreams are. The hope is that it even help you manifest them and make them happen!

Design a vision board with images and words that resonate with you- what you want for your future, goals, things that make you happy. I keep a virtual pinterest board for my vision board, but you could also get out your magazines & a poster board, or create a digital version & print it or make it your phone background.

My vision board is filled with the life I want to cultivate for myself- a happy life full of pursuing my passions, travel, business success, loving relationship & trying to keep my balance. Just looking at my vision board makes me happy!

Sometimes life gets so busy, we forget to stop & realize how much we have to be thankful for. It's easy to be negative & focus on the things we don't have or we wish we could improve.Believe it or not, a psychological study has actually been done on gratitude. A research group found that after 10 weeks, those who wrote about being grateful were more optimistic and felt better about their lives! This is something that can easily be applied to your everyday life. I'm going to dedicate a notebook to jotting down something I'm grateful for. Imagine having a year's worth of happy memories and thankful moments to look back on. Val Marie sells a gorgeous gratitude journal & there's also a great gratitude journal app if you'd rather record your thoughts digitally!

5. Invest in Yourself

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Another one of my focuses for the year will be to invest in myself! For me this means taking photography classes, continuing to learn more about graphic design & trying my hand at hand lettering and calligraphy. Lynda.com & Skillshare are great learning resources!

I also am continuing my Social Media With Style Workshops & adding one on one virtual Strategy Sessions for bloggers & small businesses. My strategy sessions include analysis & strategy creationfor your social media platforms & a conference call with me to go over everything. 've just opened up strategy sessions for 2015! See additional information here & email me if you have any questions. It's a great way to invest in yourself and your blog!How do you plan on making 2015 the best year ever?

I love the second one here - focus on work when you are working and friends and family when you are with them. I also left my job to grow my business this year and I work from home, which makes switching off pretty hard!